Last year, author, screenwriter, and host of Studio 360 Kurt Andersen joined Riverside Chats to discuss his two volume explanation of America, Fantasyland and Evil Geniuses. In that conversation, he mentioned that he was working on a third part to this series, which would be fictional. He wouldn’t give away any details at the time, but it turns out that he was working on Command Z, a new 8 part web series directed by Steven Soderbergh. The show follows a team from the 2050s who can transport their consciousnesses back into people today to try to reverse the trends leading to catastrophes of climate, economics, income inequality, and more. Today Andersen is back in conversation with Tom Knoblauch about how the series came to be, what Soderbergh could bring to the Andersen's diagnosis of the American present, and then how a show like this can impact viewers in a bleak political environment.

All episodes of Command Z are available now at commandzseries.com.